


Watch Where You're Going

by anticyclone



Category: Original Work
Genre: Adventure & Romance, F/F, Getting Together, Getting to Know Each Other, Goddesses, Hurt/Comfort, Possession, Prayer, Sharing a Body, Space Pirates, Space is like the ocean, Space monsters, Spaceships
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-23
Updated: 2020-05-23
Packaged: 2021-03-03 04:01:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,041
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24338554
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/anticyclone/pseuds/anticyclone
Summary: Vida knew she was taking a risk coming to this backwater, abandoned planet. All she needs is one big find, to make one big sale. She'd been hoping for valuable data - but she'll take a gold statue and the goddess that comes along with it. Or she'll try, anyway. Sometimes deep space isn't so empty. Sometimes all you can do is pray.
Relationships: Female Explorer/Forgotten Goddess of a Long Lost Shrine
Comments: 14
Kudos: 44
Collections: Fandom 5K 2020





	Watch Where You're Going

**Author's Note:**

  * For [skatzaa](https://archiveofourown.org/users/skatzaa/gifts).



Vida walks into the moss with all the assurance of knowing, for a fact, that an inch beneath sits solid stone. That much her environmental scanner showed her.

What the scanner didn't anticipate is the moss being so squishy. Or the glossy, oily substance oozes out under the pressure of her steps. It feels like walking across a springboard. The moss pushes back against her feet with increasing force. As if crossing feeds energy into it, giving the plant the power to propel her forward.

At least Vida hopes that the scanner was right, and this is indeed a plant underneath her feet - and not some kind of alien… thing. She's had more than enough of alien things today. The scanner had been out of date when she'd bought it, and that'd been two years ago. Also, she'd dropped it while exploring the ruins. The dusty gray case now has fine spiderweb cracking all along the side. Yet another thing to replace when she finally escapes this not-quite-goddess-forsaken planet.

By the time she reaches the end of the stretch of stone between the forest and the cliffside, her boots are coated with the oily substance.

She kicks the clean stone at the edge of the cliff. The oil leaves an impression on the ground but her boots are still slick. She crouches down and runs a finger through the stuff. It sticks to her skin and only frantically wiping it back and forth on her jacket gets it off. Her boots seem as dirty as they did a moment ago.

"This is going to make getting back down the cliff real tricky," she mutters, staring at her feet.

_'Your steps will be sure.'_

"Easy enough to say for the person who doesn't have a corporeal form. You realize if I fall I die, right?"

 _'I'm not a person.'_ A pause. _'Also, you won't fall. I won't allow it.'_

Vida wrinkles her nose. A cold wind whistleds along the top of the cliff. Judging from the sky, gray as the stone under her feet, it's going to storm any minute. If she's still on the cliff when the rain hits, she'll be dead.

 _'You won't die,'_ Ylorais tells her, placidly.

"Stop reading my thoughts. I did not agree to having my thoughts read."

Ylorais pointedly does not reply.

Sighing, Vida puts her backpack down at her feet. It holds: a thick knit cap to pull over her buzzed hair, the likely in need of replacement environmental scanner, oxygen boost shots (1 of 3 remaining), two thin light flares, and neon green climbing gloves. The gloves are the most expensive equipment she owns. They cost more than even the ascender that's supposed to brake her fall along the ropes if she does lose her grip. Vida says 'supposed to' because the ascender, like her scanner and light flares, are cheap, off-brand devices she prefers not to test to their limits. She actually has no idea if the ascender would stop her from falling.

_'I would, but I won't need to. You won't fall.'_

Vida ignores that. She flexes her fingers in the activation pattern. The gloves do what they are supposed to, and raise gripping points along her fingers. Great. At least one thing today is going according to plan.

The wind chooses that moment to howl across the clifftop. An unlucky clump of moss twists free of the rest and blows out over the edge. Vida watches it turn over and over before starting to drift out.

Then the wind lets go of it, and it drops like a stone.

"If I die, I'm coming back to haunt you," Vida declares. "I'll be - I'll be an anti-goddess."

When Ylorais sighs, it's like the sigh moves through Vida. It is the sigh of all sighs. It stretches Vida's ribs before oh so slowly spooling out of her lungs. Her breath should be warm, but where it crosses her lips it's ice cold. It condenses in the air in miniscule water droplets and crystals of ice.

The cloud of vapor drifts forward like the moss. It fans out to invisibility in front of Vida's eyes. And when the sigh has finally emptied her, the wind dies. Aside from her own heartbeat, the clifftop is silent.

Vida looks down at her hands. Her fingers flex without her. The voice now inside her head blinks her eyes without her input. _Your steps will be sure,_ Ylorais repeats. _I will not allow you to fall._

"Now seems like a bad time to point out that I'm a nonworshipper," Vida mumbles. The tips of her ears are hot.

It's been four hours since she stumbled on a weather-worn shrine tucked into the ruins of the mining colony. From the records Vida had scrounged up before landing her ship here she hadn't expected anything of the kind. But apparently once they arrived, the miners decided to invite a goddess in to live with them. The shrine and its decorations - chipped, cracked, moss-covered - were surprising enough. That the goddess was still around… 

_Deities love nonworshippers. There's no one to fight off._

That's encouraging. Vida has to move her own feet over to where she left her ropes, and she has to clip herself back onto them. But as soon as she starts descending the cliff face, she can feel more behind her grip than just her gloves. Her boots plant on footholds as if the treads are clean and dry. Each of her breaths chill her lips, but they don't fog up the air.

Vida came here for survey maps. Corporations will pay for data that they don't have to collect themselves. The original mining colony had been abandoned before the advent of new digging tech. Vida was sure that she could sell maps and mineral data to some company looking for a headstart on a mine they didn't have to open up all by themselves.

Of course, she isn't carrying data back now.

Halfway down, a bolt falls free of the cliff. Vida watches tiny chips of rock and the stick of metal fall from the corner of her eye.

She holds her breath. Her fingers tighten on the rope. The ascender is there, it's fastened correctly, it should - _should_ \- arrest her fall. Any second now. Any second she'll feel her weight yank on the rope. It will hurt, it will knock the wind out of her. Any second now it will hurt because the ascender _has to_ work, but where is the pain, Vida doesn't feel anything, just air on her face and the rope under her hand and-

_Vida. You aren't falling._

"What?"

_I told you I would not let you fall._

Her feet move assuredly to the next ledge down. Her fingers let go of the rope enough for her to lower herself. Her knees bend, and her torso shifts, and she feels her tongue press against the inside of her teeth as her body - which feels as far away now as home, at the other end of the galaxy - continues climbing without any assistance from Vida.

Vida swallows. Her throat is dry. She touches her tongue to her lips all on her own, but it doesn't help.

_'Don't worry. We're almost there.'_

***

The human's ship is a teardrop, condensed from titanium and aluminum and silica.

The outside is off-white. As they approach from the bottom of the hill, the wind rustles the tall dry grass around the human's calves. A cloud shifts away from the sun and for a brief moment the world is no longer storm-gray, but gentle yellow, like the grass. It makes the teardrop ship look like the freshwater pearls the previous colonists used to sift from the rivers sometimes. Before the mines had made the rivers run metallic and bright, brassy gold.

Ylorais shakes the memory off.

It's something she can leave here, along with the rotting wooden temple the colonists had built to call her here. Before they'd left the planet. Before they'd abandoned the mines they'd emptied, and her temple, and Ylorais.

It's not something that bothers her anymore. It was a long long time ago, at least on human timescales. All those people who'd fled the planet and left her behind and forgotten their old homes and the goddess they'd worshipped into being are probably dead now! Probably found some other goddess or god to oversee the rest of their lives. Any number of deities could've taken her humans in. The universe is vast and its wonders multitudinous.

It's _fine._

And look, Ylorias has a new human. Who did not fall off the cliff and did not die, because Ylorais made sure she didn't. She may be out of practice but she is still a goddess. She knows how to court a worshipper. Worshippers like demonstrations of power. They like a goddess who can keep her promises. They like being alive.

Speaking of.

 _'You should have told me your ship needed repairs. I would have taken you around to the mechanic's stores before we climbed down here,'_ she says.

Now that Vida is close enough to gesture the door open - like magic, but probably an implant, the last mine overseer's family had some installed, before they abandoned the place - Ylorais can see that in addition to being small and off-white, the teardrop is dented in several spots. There are also many places that have obviously been repaired. The off-white color in those sections does not match the off-white color of the rest of the shift.

Vida turns around toward the sound of Ylorais' voice. She blinks huge dark eyes. "What makes you think Nix needs repairs?"

NX-9 is inscribed on the inside of the door. Nix. Aha.

_'You're sure it's… in satisfactory working order?'_

"Nix got me here just fine," Vida says, her huge eyes narrowing. "I know she looks beat up but she's always gotten me where I needed to go."

She rolls up her sleeves to expose pale brown arms dusted with dark freckles. Her jacket and shirt are both too big and hang loose on her frame, but her arms look strong. She reminds Ylorais of the miners who'd worked long hours with hand tools. Sometimes they'd brought small, shiny chips of minerals to the temple and left them at the base of Ylorais' statue. Things the humans couldn't use themselves but had made them think of Ylorais. Vida makes an X motion with her arms, and it makes her muscles flex.

"-listening to me?" Vida asks, her hands dropping to her sides.

 _'Goddesses don't … need to listen. We understand,'_ Ylorais assures her.

Vida does not look assured.

Ylorais decides to change the subject. Humans can be hard to please, she remembers that now. _'Why don't you show me around your ship?'_

That does mollify Vida somewhat. She pushes her hat off her head as they enter Nix and runs a light touch across her very short hair. With great care, she removes her backpack and puts it into a neat little closet. Her jacket is shrugged off and thrown into a nearby chair. It's body language - oh, doesn't Ylorais look forward to having a body again, _soon_ \- that suggests she's annoyed, but her tone is anything but when she speaks. Not annoyance, then. Ylorais draws in close. Close enough to see freckles dusting the back of Vida's neck, too, where her shirt collar is flipped down.

"I've had Nix for three years. I've been all over the place with her. There's not much storage, but there's a little - I modded the floor to fit some things. Sometimes I do, uh… supply runs. Small ones. You know, when somebody needs something real quick and can't wait." Vida clears her throat and flings both her hands up, palms out. "Anyway! Let's, uh, look at the cabin."

The cabin is a room only slightly larger than the closet Vida's backpack had gone into. There are two chairs. Vida drops down into the one on the right and rapidly brings the ship to life. Panels light up, a holographic display of the planet appears on the empty wall in front of Vida, and the computer verbally runs through a checklist of flight systems that are apparently all in perfect repair.

Vida turns to the empty chair at her left. "I'm ready to leave."

Aha. Ylorais shifts to the chair. _'I am also ready to leave,'_ she says.

In Vida's backpack is the only item of importance. Past that, Ylorais has nothing tying her to this planet. Literally nothing. Being the only intelligent life in a place means that it's easy to leave behind (is that what her humans had thought, all those years ago?).

It's fine. It's fine! Ylorais has a new human.

A new human who turns again as if Ylorais has a face to look into. A human whose huge eyes sparkle when a tiny smile just barely tugs at the corners of her mouth. "You know," she says, "I won Nix in a bet."

_'Did you?'_

This detail is so delightful that Ylorais can almost ignore the shock of the ship lifting off the ground. Oh. She is no longer - She is no longer on this planet. Vida continues doing complicated things to the panel. The computer continues to read things out to her. If she pays attention to them or if they mean anything, Vida doesn't show it. The teardrop ship hovers above the hill for the time it takes Vida to inhale twice, and then it's gone.

No windows. But the holographic display shifts. It shows the blinking yellow speck representing Nix has now moved off the planet. Then it shows it moving past the cluster of moons. Then past the nearest planet. Then, suddenly, abruptly, past the edge of the solar system.

Vida types something in, leans back, and smiles another tiny smile.

Ylorais is no longer on an empty planet.

She is in a ship.

With a human. A nonworshipper who turns to face Ylorais as if she had a face to look at.

If she did have a body, it would be buzzing. The thrumming of the teardrop ship's engines will have to do for now.

***

Truelight's holographic face is projected life-size, hovering over the instrument panel. Nix may have been a used ship when Vida acquired her, and she may have been a bit - a bit patched up, it's true, but she's still a good ship. Her holographic projectors have never been faulty. In fact, they're good enough to make it feel like Vida is sitting in the same room with Truelight. The fence's pale, round face is rendered so well that Vida can _feel_ the skepticism as if it were her own.

"You want to sell… a statue," Truelight says. She raises her left arm from underneath her table, so the holograph call picks it up. She makes an open-palmed gesture. "I don't deal in antiquities, Vida."

 _'I am not ancient,'_ Ylorais bristles. _'Ancient things are useless. I am not useless.'_

Goddesses might be capable of manifesting a voice without a body, repairing broken steps before Vida walked on them and dropped through the rotting temple floor, possessing nonworshippers and helping them down cliffs, but apparently their voices don't carry over holocalls. Probably a good thing.

Vida clears her throat and casts a glance toward her left, the empty chair and space where Ylorais' voice is coming from. She looks back at Truelight. "I know you typically trade in data and information. That is why I went to the mine in the first place."

One of Truelight's thin red eyebrows goes up. "Is there a port in the bottom of the statue? Can I download survey maps from it?"

"Um. No." Vida smiles. "But remember how I brought you all those salvaged data sticks from the wrecked Aterip convoy?"

Truelight's skepticism drops. Her mouth presses into a thin line.

"The clean data sticks still with their full factory-default security settings? The ones that an enterprising person could - theoretically, of course, I mean, I'm no programmer - could use to pass off information as genuine Ateripae directives?" Vida lets her own smile drop and taps a finger against her lips. "Some people - theoretically, of course, I mean, who am I, just a trusted and consistent source of product for two whole years, that's nobody - some people might call that a favor."

 _'Vida!'_ Ylorais says, her voice pitched high.

Vida tries to act like she didn't hear it. Instead she meets Truelight's eyes and waits. People hate waiting, Vida included. But it can be useful. Truelight's eyes stay on hers for a moment before darting to the side. And then they move back and forth, like Truelight is reading something out of the holocall's range.

_'Vida. Vida. This is very important.'_

"All I want is the name of a shop or two where someone could sell a precious statue of … unconfirmable origin."

Vida instantly regrets filling the silence she herself had left, but if she hadn't said something to Truelight, she would've said something to Ylorais. She cannot explain Ylorais to Truelight. Truelight has her own array of household gods she keeps altars to - some of them aren't even from her own planet - and would absolutely pounce on Vida 'finding one of her own.' Which is not what has happened.

_'Are you a pirate, Vida?'_

"Excuse me just a second, I think I heard an alarm going off."

Truelight looks up from whatever she'd been reading over. "I didn't hear any alarm."

"Be right back!" Vida swipes the holocall into mute and then into freeze-frame, so Truelight won't see a soundless image of her spinning her chair to the left. "Ylorais. Please. I am working. If I can't sell this statue - which you very specifically told me I could sell, when you took me to it - then I wasted a whole trip." She pauses and squares her shoulders. "Also, I'm not a pirate."

The empty, silent chair in front of her somehow communicates disbelief.

Vida isn't even sure that's where Ylorais is. She isn't even sure that Ylorais _is_ in an anywhere, anyway. Vida's never had an alter, or household gods, or even a temple to go to. She's watched other people do it, but binding herself to a mysterious force who may or may not be consistently aware of her existence sounds a lot like paying galactic taxes. That's something she already spends enough of her time dealing with, thanks but no thanks.

Since boarding the ship, she's mostly heard Ylorais in her left ear, but what does that mean? For all she knows everybody who used to worship the goddess would pierce their left ears and speaking to her left is symbolic.

_'Don't worry. I love pirates. You should've told me earlier!'_

Vida glances back at the holocall. Truelight has leaned back and crossed her arms over her broad chest, so both of her arms are in frame now. She's tapping one of her fingers against her opposite elbow.

"Look, Ylorais. I'm not a pirate. But I do have work to do. Please please be quiet for five more minutes, okay?"

Ylorais sighs. At least she doesn't use Vida's lungs to do it.

Vida swipes back into the call. "Sorry about that. All taken care of. So, you got some shop names for me?"

"I have one." Truelight holds up a single finger. "Don't tell them I sent you."

"Who's Truelight? Truelight, never heard of her. I only sell my scavenged items with people whose names I can trust," Vida says, blinking rapidly and letting the corners of her mouth turn up.

At the dig about her name, Truelight snorts. Her hands disappear from frame again, although her shoulders stay. A minute later the incoming items display lights up to Vida's right. A tiny data file, plain text, the name of a shop and its map listing. There's no information on hours or how to contact the place but once Vida is in range she should be able to find that pretty easily. The shop is on the same planet, a couple of cities over from the one Truelight's nested in.

"Consider that particular favor cashed in, please."

Vida mock salutes. "Yes ma'am."

Truelight's eyebrows draw together again. "Don't call me that."

The holograph vanishes. There's a tiny beep indicating the call has disconnected. The map of their current location reappears, with a tiny dot representing Nix hovering in the deep of space.

 _'Now can we talk about your completely legitimate business ventures?'_ Ylorais asks, slyly.

***

"I am not a pirate. I'm a salvager," Vida protests. She draws her legs up into her chair, so her knees rest against the control console. When she frowns it makes a line appear between her eyes. "Also, how do you know about pirates? The colony was only around for like a hundred years and didn't have a space fleet. Or boats. Or an ocean."

 _'They had radio entertainments,'_ Ylorais says, perhaps a shade more defensively than necessary.

Vida chews on her lower lip for a moment. She reaches forward with one hand and does something to the console. What it looks like is that she's entered an entire course for the ship: a dashed line stretches across the screen. The map reorients and zooms in so the line looks straight even though Ylorais knows it's not. Nix moves across the screen, gobbling up the dashes.

"What kind of goddess listens to radio shows?"

_'When the colony's population was at its peak, I knew what happened within its borders. Including radio entertainments.'_

"And there were pirates in these entertainments."

_'In the better ones.'_

"Uh-huh."

_'Sea monsters, too.'_

"Gotta have sea monsters," Vida agrees. She's not laughing, but she has an expression on her face like she's thinking about it. "Can't be a pirate if your crew's not getting partially eaten by weird things with tentacles and fangs."

 _'They didn't get eaten,'_ Ylorais corrects. _'Everyone always got rescued. Everyone you wanted to get rescued, anyway.'_

"Are you sure you like pirates and not just sailing adventures?"

Since it's not like Vida can see her being nosy, Ylorais allows her attention to drift through the rest of the ship. _'What kind of entertainments do you like, then?'_ she asks.

"I like-" Vida hesitates. The almost-laughter in her face fades, and she shrugs. "I mean, I like what everyone likes. There's this show _Salt,_ it's like…" Her face scrunches up. It's not as cute as the almost-laughter, but it's still a little cute. "...a horror comedy musical?"

 _'That sounds terrible,'_ Ylorais says, honestly.

Vida slaps a hand across her mouth. Her shoulders shake. The laugh is silent, but it's definitely there. Definitely cute.

Ylorais abruptly decides to let her attention drift to the rest of the ship. Now that Vida's accepted her as a traveling companion, Ylorais has an awareness of everything in her domain - which is all of Nix, at the moment. Also, it's not like Vida can see that she's being nosy.

 _'I like pirates because they get to travel. And have adventures.'_ The space immediately behind the cabin must be the general living area. A tiny ceramic cooking area is enclosed with some kind of thick plastic. There are two chairs tucked on either side of a small table.

"I guess traveling isn't something a goddess really gets to do."

 _'I could. If my people traveled. But they didn't._ Most of the other wall is devoted to a storage bench with a soft cushion strapped to its length. There are blankets piled on it but no pillows. The bed must be somewhere else, then… 

"What, like, if they put your statue in a shrine on a ship?"

_'That wouldn't hurt.'_

The statue is about a foot tall. The base is half as large as Vida's palm. Stealing it in the colony's heyday would have been nearly impossible. Even if a thief had gotten into the temple alone, she never could've pried the statue from its shrine without tools and lots of noise. But it has been so long since the temple had anyone to tend it. The doors rotted away years ago. The entire shrine had been subject to all the elements of the planet, and the floor had been more dirt than stone when Vida walked across it.

Stealing the figure today had only been a matter of Ylorais telling Vida where to look.

"You know I can't really promise what kind of person is going to end up buying that thing, right? I mean, I don't even know the reputation of the shop owner. I could look into it, but finding another place to - to sell what's obviously an old, sacred work of art with no verification documents…" Vida's voice trails off. She scratches the side of her neck.

 _'I'm not concerned,'_ Ylorais says, only half paying attention. It's nice that Vida cares, but the statue isn't that sentimental. Ylorais never really thought it'd been that good of a likeness, even when she'd had a body to have a likeness of.

The bed turns out to be in a nook with a door that rolls into the ceiling. There's a chest of drawers under it where Vida keeps her clothes, all variations on a theme of slightly too large, dark-colored, with an excess of pockets. There is storage underneath the floor for parts for the ship. There's storage for food. There's access hatches. That's pretty much it. Nowhere looks like it could be repurposed for a household (shiphold?) shrine.

"Don't you … I don't know, doesn't the kind of worshipper you get matter?"

Ylorais doesn't see how that matters when it comes to selling the statue. Besides, the important thing is having a believer at all. Once someone believes in her again - really, really believes in her, and commits to that belief - she'll have a body again.

She hopes she remembers how to use it.

_'You said you needed money, correct? To buy passage somewhere?'_

"To buy a visa," Vida says. She bites her lip. "There's… a new colony network being settled on some uninhabited planets, but to reach them you have to have passage through a wormhole, and that's expensive. But if I can get a visa, then I can sign on to be one of the first transplants. No more salvaging. Being a transplant gets you a steady income because they want you to do all the hard work of looking around for livable land for them."

Ylorais is about to ask more when Nix rocks so wildly the force of it slashes through the inertial dampeners.

***

The seat belts on the pilot's chair snap across Vida's thighs, her waist, and across her chest in an X. She sucks in a sharp gasp as the chair spins back to face the control panel. 

_'Vida, what's happening?'_

The holograph display is now showing her the ship spiraling off course - what - _'What is that, on screen?'_ \- why is - The light in the cabin turns red, as if Vida wouldn't have noticed the alarms, or being locked into place - _'I can't read that text!_ \- The text in the holograph display shifts brighter and spills out several translations in various languages, to make it easier to see, see the…

The dot representing Nix on screen vanishes. In its place is a coil of light. It's ten times as long as the ship and wrapped around several times in the middle. Its tail flicks violently and its head strains to the side. The light pulls away from the dotted line of their course. Nix bounces.

What is _happening?_

"Maybe - Maybe a beacon. The problem is the colony was in the middle of nowhere, every system around is totally uninhabited. But maybe…"

The alarm is so loud. There's a way to make the alarms be quiet and the lights to change back to normal but right now Vida doesn't have the time to do that. She scrambles to access communications and the detachable beacon she hasn't looked at in two whole trips and which is hopefully still functioning correctly. The nearest source of help isn't near at all, but if she wants a chance of reaching them she has to do it - _now._

On screen a tiny dot blinks as it soars away from the ship, broadcasting a general SOS.

 _'Oh, I see.'_ Ylorais's voice is soft. _'It's a nebula eel.'_

Vida inhales. The ship bounces again, so hard it makes her body strain against the seat belts.

Nebula eel. Of course it's a nebula eel. She hadn't recognized it because… Because it'd come out of nowhere. Shouldn't it have shown up on the sensors before it'd grabbed the ship? "I don't understand where this thing came from," she hisses. She tries discharging some electricity from a minor system. If it does anything to the eel, it does something worse to the ship (or the eel does), rocking them again. Vida is starting to feel nauseated.

"It's trying to bring us back to the nebula to eat us. The nearest nebula is over an hour away at this speed. Live prey could maybe survive that long but we won't," Vida rambles.

_'I know how nebula eels kill. The miners told me about them.'_

At 'kill,' Vida's hands start shaking. "This doesn't make any sense, it doesn't…"

_'It could live in a dark nebula.'_

"A what?"

 _'The first miners passed by one on their route here. They said it was small. Like… a glob,'_ Ylorais says. When Vida spares a whole two seconds to turn and stare blankly at the empty chair, Ylorais adds, defense, _'I didn't name it.'_

"No, I know - I know what a globule is, I just… I didn't... The scanning equipment's gotten all smashed up, I can't try to look for it. It could be close. It could be really close."

She pounds at the controls. Tries changing direction so the engines will shoot out at the eel. For a second it even changes things.

On screen, their projected path jerks wildly. The eel uncoils a little. Vida watches its head - or its tail, maybe - list to one side. She holds her breath. There's a moment between wails of the alarm where she's not breathing, and Ylorais is obviously not breathing, and the ship's other alerts are quiet. Maybe. Maybe the eel will fall away. Maybe she can pour all the energy reserves into the engines and-

On screen, the light of the eel's energy signature contracts.

The lights go out. The holograph map dies. There's an angry mechanical buzzing as backup power keeps the air flowing, but it's only enough to light the emergency lights on the floor. It's not enough to bring the map back. It's not enough to bring the _engines_ back.

"Fuck," Vida whispers, pressing her palms to the dead control panel. "Fucking fuck."

 _'Fucking fuck,'_ Ylorais echoes.

***

Vida blinks short eyelashes and water gathers in her eyes. There is a thin, dark scar on her scalp. Ylorais can just see it through her buzzed hair. She didn't notice that, before.

Because she's not human, and because had been freed of her old planet at the same instant Nix had, she can feel every turn of the ship. Every bounce. When the nebula eel squeezes the hull, Ylorais feels the pressure. Ylorais feels it writhing. The eel screeches silently into unforgiving vacuum and Ylorais can feel the scream in her own throat.

Her throat has far fewer rings of serrated teeth, though.

Or - It does when Ylorais has a body. Did. Does?

Vida's hands are still shaking.

Ylorais remembers having hands. She isn't entirely certain she remembers exactly how to use them - she remembers them being fiddly, she remembers fumbling at buttons, dropping things, how easy it is to hurt a fragile, physical form (she remembers losing hers and how much it _hurt,_ how wind raced and whistled through the empty settlement and how there was no one there to hold her hand).

"Maybe - Maybe if I access it manually, I can restart-" Vida's hands fumble at the straps keeping her safe in her seat.

_'No. Stay put.'_

"But I can't reach it from here. I can't do anything from here. I have to-" Nix bounces, and Vida visibly winces from the impact. Her body slams back against her seat.

**_'Stay.'_ **

Ylorais pushes herself outside the ship.

It doesn't hurt. There's nothing in her to hurt, not anymore. Not if her thoughts don't settle in one spot for too long. Ylorais floats high enough - low enough? space is confusing - to get a good look at the nebula eel, wrapped around Nix.

A thin, fragile tether of knowledge keeps her anchored to the teardrop ship. Vida may not be a worshipper, but she thinks of Ylorais as her own being. She turns to empty space to make contact with eyes that aren't there. For now, that's enough. It will have to be enough. Space is so large and the ship and the eel are still moving. Ylorais can't afford to lose track of either of them.

Moving. Right. She has to move, too. Has to focus, keep her sight on the teardrop ship.

The eel is so large Ylorais has nothing to compare it to. It glows as bright as it had on the map. Yellow and orange, with soft rippling spines all along its top and bottom that shift from pink to white and back again. It is so huge. It's wrapped its body around the ship several times over. Ylorais has to shift her perception to even make Nix out between its coils. The eel looks ribbon-thin, but only in comparison to how far out its head stretches and how long its tail trails behind it. When Ylorais focuses, she can see the eel is wide enough to swallow Nix whole.

That's … That's a bad thought. Ylorais forces it away. Don't settle, don't settle. Concentrate.

She has a human. She has a human. She's not alone.

The eel does not have eyes but it does have a forest of wispy, curling spines across the space above its mouth where a face could be. The spines shudder when Ylorais draws close enough to see that they're lined with tiny feathers of pure energy.

_'This is not yours.'_

It screams again. Ylorais can feel it even though she can't hear it. It thrusts its head towards her and finds no physical resistance. The force of the lunge makes it tumble through vacuum, dragging Nix in an arc. Ylorais risks a second to peer in through the hull - so solid from inside, so eggshell thin from this perspective - and sees Vida bracing herself on the control panel.

In the entertainments, everyone you want to get rescued always does.

Ylorais does not have hands, but she does have energy. She can coil around the eel's head and crush it as easily as it's squeezing Nix.

***

"Ylorais? Ylorais! I can't hear you. I can't-" Vida chokes, and scrubs at her eyes with her hands. She spreads her fingers and when she looks at the control panel it's just as dark as it was a minute ago. Her fingers tremble against her cheeks. "Ylorais! Fuck, I don't know how to do this. I don't know how to do this."

Ylorais had ordered her to stay put. Something in her voice had felt physical, like a force pressing Vida down into her pilot's chair. But Ylorais' voice is gone. It's been nearly ten minutes since Ylorais left. For the first few, it seemed like nothing was happening at all. The eel didn't thrash any more and it felt like the ship just kept moving through space. Probably not as fast, without the engines propelling them along, but.

But. Right. Vida has to - She has to do something.

She fumbles at the clips on her seat belts until they come undone. If the power had been on, an alarm would probably go off now, telling her to stay put. But the power is not on and Vida still needs to do something about that.

She doesn't know where Ylorais is and she doesn't know how to find out. She does know how to force the cabin doors open and bolt to the back of the ship. She does know how to open the safety release on the access panel for the engines.

"Ylorais," she says. It doesn't seem like Ylorais can hear her, but it's so dark. The only light is from the emergency strips on the floor and from the motion-sensor light buried in the engine controls when Vida reaches down to begin the force restart sequence. It's so dark, and she has to say something. "I'm trying to restart things. It'll be harder for rescue to find us if we don't have full power. Not to mention, you know, life support. A little worried about that."

The ship shudders. Vida freezes, but her legs are planted firmly on the floor. She keeps working.

"Listen, I don't… The beacon is still our best chance."

More lights turn on in the controls. A blue one beams steadily for a moment before starting to fade in and out. Vida squints and watches it, trying to count. It's slower than she wants, but the speed is picking up. Counting down to full restart.

"I don't know how to pray," Vida admits, flipping another switch. Manually closing off systems that she doesn't absolutely need. Giving the engine more access to reserve power. "I like being able to go wherever I want and I never wanted a goddess wanting me to go back somewhere. But I-"

Some kind of force ripples through Nix. Vida gasps and jerks her hands up to her head.

The engines hadn't shocked her, but her hands feel burned. Her whole body feels burned. She looks at her skin to make sure it isn't charred. Her hands are shaking so bad. 

She tries to grab onto the nearest handhold but her fingers slip. The ship is rolling, she can feel it, they're tumbling over and over so fast that what's left of the inertial dampeners can't hold it all at bay.

"Whatever you're doing, Ylorais, try to do it faster! Please!"

It's a shitty prayer. Vida can tell that much. But it's the best she's got. There's no time to come up with anything else.

Her body slams up against the wall.

Everything that hasn't gone dark does now.

***

When she wakes up everything is still dark.

For a long stretch of minutes Vida lies there doing math about how long she may have been unconscious. How much power minimal life support draws. How much energy had been in the backup power system. All the numbers turn up negative. She blinks, and it's still dark, but there's air in her lungs when she breathes. So she's dropped a number somewhere.

Or maybe it's just that there's a blanket draped over her head. That's why it feels like the air is stale. She groans, and pulls it down off her face.

What she'd expected to see was the berth of a rescue ship. What she actually sees is … Nix.

Vida is in her own bed, in Nix, except the door's been left raised up like Vida isn't prone to tumbling out of bed in the middle of the night. Also, one of her pillows is under her feet.

She starts to sit up and swing her feet down. That turns out to be a terrible idea.

Sitting up makes her head throb so hard the whole ship pulses with it. Vida presses her face back down into the pillow. Her ankle also hurts. She stays in bed and pulls her knees up to her chest. Breathing. Breathing is fine. Her back is sore, but her ribs don't ache. Her eyes don't hurt when she opens them again and looks out at the ship.

Nix is fine. Or, Nix looks fine. There's no readout panels next to the bed. The lights are on, though. Air is circulating through the living space at its normal rate. After several minutes, Vida tries gingerly picking herself up again and tiptoes down the short hall into the living area. All of her things have been piled onto the storage bench couch. Some of them look worse for wear - that tablet's screen is cracked - but the ship hasn't been destroyed.

The door to the cabin is closed.

When she opens it, the first thing she sees is the statue. It's been set at the corner of the controls. It looks smaller in here than it had at the shrine.

It's gold, or gold-colored. It hadn't felt like it weighed enough to be what Vida thinks of as gold. It's in the shape of a robed woman with long braids. The woman's hands are held out before her, palms down. Ylorais had said that when the mining colony was inhabited, the miners kept a small ceramic bowl beneath the statue. It'd been created for Ylorais to channel aether through. She'd condense it into gemstone beads, which would drop into the bowl, and the miners were able to sell them and use them in jewelry.

The second thing Vida sees is the woman sitting in the pilot's chair. She doesn't look anything like the statue. Not really.

***

"So," Vida says. "What usually happens after they rescue the pirate from the sea monster?"

"Oh, you know. The rescued pirate pledges her fealty to her captain. Builds a little shrine. Nothing too big, nothing that will get in the way. Begins regular prayers. Just thank yous, nothing burdensome. Enough to keep the belief flowing. The captain attains deity status and they sail around the ocean collecting treasures." Ylorais is rambling. The tips of her ears are hot. This is not what she'd practiced saying, alone in the cabin for hours. But in her fantasies - When she'd practiced, Vida had also said something like, 'Thanks for saving my life,' or, 'Wow, your new body looks amazing,' or 'Hello.'

Vida squints at her now. "No they don't."

"No, they don't," Ylorais admits. She sighs and shrugs. "They usually just kiss and everybody laughs when the captain takes the pirate back to her private bunk."

"Uh-huh." One corner of Vida's mouth has turned up. She carefully walks forward, one step a time, until she can sit down in the empty left chair.

Ylorais turns her chair sideways to face Vida. She crosses her long legs and realizes abruptly that she's surely a head taller than Vida, at least. Oh. Maybe that had been a mistake. She had been so happy to watch this body form she had only wanted to make sure she wouldn't bump her head on the ship as she moved around. She hadn't thought about being taller than Vida.

Vida rubs at her face like she's tired. She folds her arm to rest an elbow on the control panel, and sets her cheek against her hand. "Four arms?" she asks.

"I thought it would be useful," Ylorais says. Her ears are still hot. Now her cheeks are, too.

She had maybe been thinking too hard about remembering how hands worked when she'd felt herself start the process of becoming solid again. She folds her upper set of hands in her lap and plucks at her dress with the others. Then she realizes that makes her looks anxious and hurriedly smoothes the fabric out instead.

The dress is everything Vida's clothing is not. Well, except that it does have four pockets. Ylorais remembers that hands get cold. The dress gathers at her shoulders in twists. The neckline dips low to show off skin the color of freshly turned earth, with a gold undertone that's echoed in the metallic overlay of the gown. It cinches at her waist and spills down to her ankles in gauzy waves. When she'd finished forming it, she'd found a mirror in the bathroom and spun around just to watch the skirt ripple.

Vida doesn't comment on the dress. "I feel like I got stuck into a centrifuge."

"I did fix your head," Ylorais says, quickly. "It will take time for my power to build up, but I was able to do that."

"What was wrong with my head?" Vida sits up a little and reflexively touches her head. Her hand goes straight to the spot at the back of her skull that had been… 

Ylorais inhales. She makes herself smile broadly. Vida blinks, startled, and her hand drops. Ylorais says, "It's fine now! Um. So is the ship. Nix. Nix is fine. We're fine - I asked Nix to switch to voice controls and we're on our way to meet up with a salvage hauler. They're going to examine Nix and then go collect what they can from the nebula eel."

Vida is looking at her strangely. She glances down and then up, through her eyelashes. She'd been staring at Ylorais before but now she looks quickly at the control panel like she doesn't want to be caught staring. Ylorais turns to look at the control panel too. Her smile slips away.

"How did you beat it? The eel?"

Ylorais hesitates. Her lower hands pluck at her skirt. "I heard you praying," she says, quietly.

Vida wraps her arms around her middle.

"I tried to go as fast as I could. When the miners left…" Ylorais falters. Clears her throat. (No rings of serrated teeth. She'd thought as hard about everything _but_ rings of serrated teeth as she'd been able.) "There are always small spirits around. It's just that most of them never get invoked enough to gain names. It's just, the sprite of finding lost things, or the fay who keeps your ancient oven running well enough to bake, or… You know."

Vida looks up. "What were you?"

She did a good job with the gown. She really does think so. The metallic overlay catches the light so prettily when she lifts it and moves it across the cream-colored skirt underneath. She hums under her breath and says, offhandedly, "I did lots of things, but opening locks was a specialty of my early days."

Vida grins. It's the first big smile that Ylorais has gotten from her, and it lights up her whole face. Her eyes sparkle. "You were a goddess of thi - of salvagers," she says.

Ylorais sniffs. "Salvaging is a legitimate business."

"You don't have to tell me," Vida says. She glances over at the statue on the console.

"It wasn't damaged. It'll still get you a good price, assuming this person doesn't cheat you. Which they shouldn't," Ylorais says, frowning. Maybe she should come along to the exchange. She will probably need different clothes for that, but manifesting a set of planetside travel clothes shouldn't be that difficult. Not with the rush of energy she's feeling every time Vida's eyes move to linger on her.

Which is a lot.

Vida is looking at her now. She looks like she's in pain. Or something. Her face is creased. The grin is gone.

"We'll make sure you have enough money for your visa," Ylorais insists.

The gems she can make with the statue should ensure that, although if she needs to make gems, they'll have to spend a bit of extra time in space before selling the statue off. One human believer isn't enough to restore all her power. Prayers and tributes wouldn't hurt, either, but long experience has taught her that those are best when not demanded.

Vida rubs her hand against the side of her neck. She exhales, sits up straight, and holds one of her hands out in front of herself. Her dark eyes are solemn. But her voice trembles a little when she speaks. "Okay, which one of your… Is there like, a protocol to which…"

"To what?"

Vida bites her lip. Does that glance-down-glance-up thing again. "I want to hold your hand," she says.

Ylorais's whole face is hot. She sticks her two upper hands out, palms down.

***

Vida blinks and then laughs a little. She hesitantly reaches out and cups both her hands around Ylorais'. Their hands are nearly the same size. For some reason she hadn't been expecting that. Probably because even sitting down, Ylorais looks like she's going to be very tall. Not that that's a bad thing.

"Um," she says. "I don't really know how to do this. Do I like, say a prayer, or…"

"You could do that. If you want to," Ylorais says, brightly. She is holding Vida's hands back. Her fingers are warm. Vida briefly wonders what it would be like to have all four of Ylorais's warm hands on her skin.

Uh. Yeah. She clears her throat. "I - Sorry. My family wasn't… We never kept with any goddesses, or anything," she tries to explain. "I don't really know how you tell one you're going to. I mean…."

Ylorais continues smiling at her. If she's upset that Vida is so very bad at this worshipper thing already, it doesn't show on her face.

Vida decides maybe she should be standing up for this. It feels strange, sitting down. It feels intimate. Not exactly appropriate to telling a goddess that maybe - if she wants! - Vida could… try… this whole worshipping thing out. On a trial basis.

She stands up. Her ankle buckles.

"Oh!"

All of a sudden Vida is off her feet. Sideways. She's sideways. But it's not because Nix has been thrown to the side by another nebula eel. It's because Ylorais used all four of her surprisingly strong arms to lift Vida off the floor. Vida realizes this at the same moment she realizes she has her arms wrapped around Ylorais' broad shoulders.

"You should have told me your ankle still hurt," Ylorais scolds. She is just tall enough not to bump her head when she carries Vida through the door into the main part of the ship. "Don't worry. The damage isn't permanent. If I don't collect enough power to heal it fast enough, it'll heal on its own. Now, bed or couch?"

Vida's brain cracks. From this angle, she can see the muscles in Ylorais' shoulders, and her face is level with Ylorais' collarbone. There's a single freckle on the inner curve of her breast. "Huh?"

"You need to keep your feet up," Ylorais says, as if that was at all self-explanatory. "Hmm."

They sit down on the couch. Both of them. Ylorais does not put Vida down, she simply sits near one end of the couch and positions Vida so both of Vida's legs stretch across her lap. She reaches around with her two left arms to tuck a throw pillow behind Vida's back.

"There! That's better."

Well, Vida's feet are up. So. Sure.

Ylorais' left arms rest against Vida's back. Her lower right arm drapes across Vida's knees, and her upper right arm is crooked, her elbow on her lower elbow, so Ylorais can rest her chin in her hand. In the cozy space of Vida's couch she looks even more otherworldly than before. At least in the cabin she'd looked like she could be the goddess of small craft pilots.

Now she looks like an ethereal being sitting on a secondhand cushion in a space that is slightly too small for her. She's tall, probably on account of the, uh, arms. Her legs are long. Her shoulders are broad, and so are her thighs. Actually, Vida could probably sit in her lap and oh no she is not going to go down that path.

Worshippers probably don't think about straddling their goddess' laps. Vida brushes that thought as far back in her mind as it's willing to go. "Uh. So. I guess - No on selling the statute."

"What? Why not?"

Vida is startled to find her heart squeezed. She tries not to think about the eel, but it's hard, because looking at the ship makes her think about the eel, and the only other place to look right now is Ylorais' face. "I thought you wanted to stay?"

"What does the statue have to do with that?" Ylorais tilts her head to one side. It makes her long hair shift.

"Because…." Vida falters. She gives up. "You got me. I don't know. Isn't the statue important to being a goddess?"

Of all things, Ylorais laughs. "No!"

"Great," Vida says. "I understand nothing."

"It was a part of my old shrine. Any importance it had disappeared when … the miners stopped holding it in importance," Ylorais says, her voice getting quieter the longer the sentence goes on. She pauses for a moment before starting to speak again. "You can make a new shrine! If you want. I mean, you don't have to, it does help, especially since it's not like you have room here to move in a few more worshippers," she laughs, rolling her eyes. "Anyway. If you really wanted to keep it, I could use it to make gemstones for you to sell for your visa. It doesn't look like me anymore, anyway."

"It does not," Vida agrees. She blinks. "Sorry. Gemstones?"

Ylorais explains about the statue. Vida doesn't understand what aether is, although she's heard people talk about it before. Ylorais says it's part of the 'background fabric of the universe.'

The point is: Affording a wormhole visa and securing a spot as a transplant worker is not going to be a problem. Vida may have the goddess of 'scavengers' in her lap - so to speak - but she isn't going to be one of those anymore. She's going to get to go planetside. Hike through fields. Climb more cliffsides. Swim in lakes and rivers. Test soil, air, water… 

"Ylorais," she says, smiling, "I think you're going to enjoy exploring."

And, okay. She might still salvage occasionally. If you find something abandoned, you can't just leave it there. Even if it isn't as good as a disembodied voice whispering _'Hello'_ in your left ear.

"But no more sea monsters. Or nebula monsters. Or monsters of any kind," Ylorais says.

"Oh, no. I'm buying a sonic cannon," Vida says. "A big one."

Ylorais is so delighted she clasps two of her hands across her mouth.


End file.
